Not wanting a sibling at my funeral

[gertcher]

I've name changed for this.

I'm really not well. I'm ever hopeful that I will get better but it's not guaranteed!

It's made me think ...

I've a sibling that I don't get on with because they've treated my elderly parents badly.

It's got to the stage that I don't even want to be in the same room as my sibling!

Should the worst happen to me, I wouldn't want them at my funeral.

How do I go about making sure they don't attend? Is it a big ask to tell another family member to make sure they don't come?!

I wouldn't want mine at my funeral either. Ive told dh if he lets them cone I'll come back and fucking haunt him

I don't want to tell you how to feel, but is it worth spending your emotional energy on something that will happen after you're gone, and won't affect you? Funerals are mostly about the comfort of the living. Does it matter who comes?

If you feel so strongly then write to him or her and just say you I don't want you to come to my funeral. Then they'll know from the horse's mouth and either won't go or, as it's a public event, they will but you will never know about it anyway.

Don't leave anyone else with the bother of having to pass the message on.

Trying to do this will just cause a lot of problems and drama for the people you leave behind.

Leave a Letter of Wishes, and hopefully whoever is organising the funeral won’t inform or invite them.

If you don’t get along then will the sibling even want to come?
It seems a daft thing to be thinking about, and your energy could be better spent positively.

Funerals are for the living, not the dead.
Maybe the living would value the opportunity to come together and heal?

My DH is NC with his son who has treated us appallingly. Just because of this he's asked for a direct cremation and if I outlive him I'll have a party where we can share memories. A party is private so the family can easily exclude him. I think this is the best solution.

Funerals can be private. We have a system at work that if a funeral is private then only people with the password can obtain information about the service.
Private funerals won't be put on the crematorium days service list either. It is a very common problem among families and usually the funeral director knows before hand of any potential issues.

You could ask your family not to tell your sibling. I am sure they can request that church/crematorium etc do not put the details online. I am so sorry you are having to think of this.

You can have a private funeral.

I don't know if they are all the same but we wanted to go to an old colleagues funeral and we just looked it up on the crematorium's website. Obviously won't work if she isn't told about the death but she might be able to find out the day/time if she knows about the death and is prepared to look through a few days' listings.Just seen you can have them left off the list so worth knowing that.

You could write a letter you ask to be read live at your funeral and entrust it to someone you know will follow your wishes.

Then use it to say what you think of them. Two fingers from beyond the grave! If they have come, they'll probably regret it.

Well when this happened to my friends family the sibling was given the wrong date and family agreed it was for the best, somehow more respectful to honour the last wishes of the deceased

Like a wedding ceremony in church a funeral is public and anyone can attend. All you can do is make sure everyone knows you do not want this person at your funeral. They can be banned from the wake though if it is private.

You are being petty.

The funeral is for the living to celebrate their loved ones life.

If they want this family member at the funeral then it’s up to them.

You can ask that this person doesn’t go but there’s not a lot you can do about it and the last thing your family need is extra stress about fulfilling your wishes.

That's a fucking awful thing to do to someone. I have estranged family members (and funerals coming up) so I realise how difficult it is, but giving someone the wrong date is just cowardly and cruel.

They said it was ‘mix up’ 🤷🏼‍♀️

@sprigatito I don't think it is, they don't have a right to be there

I think it’s up to the family to respect the wishes of the deceased.

Emotional energy is very precious, and you are wasting yours on something really pointless.

Seriously? Are you twelve?

I think the celebrant / vicar might have other advice about that.

If was my funeral, the celebrant/ vicar would be expected to do as they'd been bloody instructed.

If I ever felt in the situation where I wanted to do that, it would be a condition of my Will that my wishes are carried out - otherwise all the assets left to an animal charity.

Do you actually think it’s the celebrant’s job to evict your unwanted relative from a ceremony? Do they have to physically remove them, or are you imagining some kind of strike where they refuse to go ahead with the funeral until the offending person has been removed? Do you not think they might have other duties to carry out that might preclude an hours-long stand off in the church? You get they’re not your employee, right?

And while I kind of enjoy the idea of someone threatening to give their money to charity unless their wishes about funeral attendance are carried out, the fact is that unless you somehow arrange before your death for a neutral non-beneficiary executor to supervise the funeral, taking photo ID on the door or something to establish said relative isn’t there, I imagine it would be very difficult to arrange two different bequests dependent on legally establishing said person’s presence or absence at a funeral.

Isn’t it just as likely your family would say ‘Yeah, let’s just pretend Creepy Cousin Bill didn’t come and claim our bequests’?

I'm a parish minister, and if reading out a letter like this was a condition of taking the service then your poor family would have to look for someone else to take the service, and I think/hope they'd struggle to find anyone! And the people who organise and conduct funeral services aren't your slaves to be ordered about!

I have some experience of taking funeral services where family relationships are challenging and fractured. Attempting to ban individuals from funerals always makes an already difficult day many times worse, and when the person wanting to do the banning is in the coffin, then there is no gain but only harm.